If you’re the owner of the kind of company that consists of shipping out product to customers on a daily basis, then you probably have a warehouse where you store all of those items. And being that a successful business consists of getting your customers the products that they ordered in a timely fashion, it’s important that your warehouse runs as effectively and efficiently as possible.
So, if you’d like a few tips on things that you can start implementing to speed up your warehouse operations, here are five steps to start using today:
Label boxes correctly. There are a lot of people who end up spending an unnecessary amount of time inside of their warehouse and it’s due to one simple reason: their boxes are not labeled in a way where they can be easily read. One of the best ways to prevent this from being an issue is by taking a digital photograph of what is inside of each box and then putting that photo on the box. Also, it’s a good idea to stack all of your boxes vertically rather than horizontally. That way, you’ll have more room.
Keep “high ticket items” upfront. All businesses have some items that sell better than others. Once you go through your inventory list and you realize what yours are, move all of those things to the front of the warehouse – closest to your entry door. Also, make sure to keep those items close together too. By implementing this system, it can easily shave off several minutes each time you or one of your staff members goes into your warehouse to get something.
Use inventory apps. When it comes to keeping up with your inventory, thankfully you no longer have to solely rely on a pen and paper. Now you can use your mobile device and a couple of apps to keep up with your inventory in real time. To check out a list of some of the best inventory apps, visit Forbes and put “best inventory management apps” into the search field.
Minimize your traffic. There really should only be three reasons why people go into a warehouse. It’s to get an item, to put an item back, or the clean the space. Therefore, there should always be a limited amount of individuals who are inside of the warehouse at any given time. The best way to monitor this is to assign specific individuals to go into the warehouse. Not only does this help to minimize traffic (which also minimizes confusion), but it can help you to narrow down who you should speak with should something go missing or something gets broken.
Keep it clean. If you were to ask someone who works at a company like Heubel Material Handling, Inc. for some warehouse efficiency tips, one of the things they would probably tell you is to make sure that your warehouse stays as clean as possible at all times. By having limited amounts of clutter, it will help to prevent accidents. Plus, it will make things much easier to find. For tips on how to keep your warehouse clean, visit National Warehouse and put “keep your warehouse clean” into the search field.